Tuesday, 8 November 2011

An article on August 7 said the former MP Elliot Morley, who was jailed for his role in the MPs expenses scandal, was said to have been roughed up by a fellow prisoner, frogmarched to his cell and forced to hand over a £3,000 Rolex watch. We quoted sources at Ford Prison. In fact, Mr Morley suffered only a minor theft when his room key and ID card were snatched from his lanyard. He has never owned a Rolex. There was no ‘lockdown’ of the jail.

On August 9 we reported that former MP Elliot Morley, who was jailed in May, had been assaulted in Ford Prison, marched to his cell and forced to hand over a £3,000 Rolex watch.

In fact, Mr Morley has never owned a Rolex watch and suffered only a minor theft when his room key and ID card were snatched from his lanyard. He did not lose a watch or any other valuable. There was also no "lockdown" of the jail.

The Sun appears to have repeated the Mail on Sunday's article, without checking it, two days later. Now, it has repeated the correction two days later, too.

3 comments:

There seem to be an increasing number of stories appearing in the tabloids about incidents that have allegedly taken place in prisons up and down the country.

When stories like these do make it to the papers surely the two possible sources are either convicted inmates who witnessed the event or prison officers. If the papers involved are paying inmates or prison staff this must either breach PCC rules or could even be illegal if public servants are being paid to divulge information.

It's the sheer stupidity of the original article that really annoys me. Even if he did have a £3000 Rolex, what kind of idiot would you have to be to be wearing it in prison or have it in your cell. No-one is that stupid, therefore the story is bullshit. So many articles defy even the most basic logic. I really don't know how reporters justify it to themselves when they write that rubbish. The whole tabloid agenda is one thing, but stuff like this is just lazy bullshit.